A mobile mania

It is useful. What is more, it is fashionable. The cellular telephone is part of the Chennai scene, its shrill ring adding to the deafening cacophony. Walk into a cinema or a hospital, you will find several of these gizmos shining and shouting for attention, writes GAUTAMAN BHASKARAN.

A SHRIEK interrupted the kiss. As Kamal gathered Rani in his arms, and his lips sought hers on the screen, a viewer's cellular telephone played spoil sport. Some in the audience laughed. Some moaned. The others tried hard not to let their minds wander off that celluloid moment of sheer ecstasy.

This about all sums up the mobile angst the world over. As has been the case with just about every other invention over the centuries, the cellular technology has been viewed with both joy and sorrow, with excitement and irritation.

Of course, nobody can even remotely disagree that the mobile telephone has been a great boon. Whether it be the fishermen of India's West coast or the small businesswomen in Bangladesh or Japan's teeming number of schoolgirls (not quite boys, and I wonder why), this little gadget, which is indeed getting tinier and more sophisticated by the day, has virtually changed the user's life. It has made his or her economic struggle that much more easy to grapple with, and for the kid in a Tokyo cafe or on Hiroshima street or in the parks of Europe, the instrument helps connect with love, romance and fun.

The cellular telephone has a hundred other uses, some of which are really beyond the wildest of one's imagination. A group of journalists at Cannes on the French Riviera might have spent the entire night in a small elevator - which stalled between two floors - had it not been for their mobiles. In Mumbai, I remember being guided to a difficult address over this device, and without which I could have well taken hours to find the person I was looking for.

In Rome, in London, in Singapore, it is common to see men and women utilise the cellular telephone with apt appropriateness: as a time saver. They speak into it as they walk, as they ride an escalator, as they drive or travel in a train.

But in India, Chennai included, there is more hype to it, there is still that tag of status attached to this "walkie-talkie". Young executives, women at kitty parties and college kids flash their mobiles with an air of unconcealed glee.

And what do they normally use them for ? One, to say "hello" to a colleague. Two, to ask the maid if tea is ready ? Three, to whisper "I love you". These wireless sessions can stretch endlessly, and can be annoying to others...

---as an elderly couple realised. Out to spend a quiet evening with each other in a Chennai restaurant, they found the hackneyed, loud conversation of a youth over the cellular at the next table a terrible nuisance. Till, the old man got up, walked up to the offender and ticked him off in no uncertain terms.

Mobile manners are just absent in Chennai, and elsewhere in the country. Repeated requests to switch off cellulars during a Jaya Bachchan play the other evening in Chennai made no impact on a crowd that was educated and elitist. Later, even the warnings made no difference.

But what I consider a greater blot on etiquette is the use of this contraption in a crematorium. I heard people talking shop at the one in Besant Nagar, unmindful of the grief and wailing all around. Such disrespect to the dead, such callousness to suffering are a terrible reflection on our society.

However, a more pressing concern today has little to do with decency and decorum. As with most other discoveries, the cellular telephone has its share of controversy. Can the radiation it emits harm one who holds it ? Can it lead to brain tumour? Are children more vulnerable than adults? Naturally these questions are worrying, particularly in the kind of times we live in when health is a major casualty of just about every modern ism. Whether it is the food we eat or the air we breathe, they seem to be laced with poison. The mobile is an added anxiety.

But P.H. Rao, the managing director of Chennai's SkyCell, thinks that there is no basis for this apprehension. "It is only people like you and me who do a lot of reading tend to get perturbed. The average person here or elsewhere in India does not even give a thought to this".

Instrument manufacturers and other service providers agree with this. They say such fears were associated with so many other inventions. The steam engine, at one point of time, seemed ghoulish to many, who literally took to their heels at the sight of this "puffing devil". The electric bulb had its early detractors, some of whom were candle-makers whose dislike for the glowing glass had an obvious reason.

Although research into cellular science has not revealed any definite link between usage and disease, one would do well to exercise restraint. It must not be forgotten that most of the study has been conducted by mobile telephone makers themselves, and there is this sneaking suspicion that they can be withholding vital information from the people, similar to the way some major tobacco companies manipulated facts to safeguard their commercial interests.

So, some countries, like for instance, Britain and the U.S., have, as a measure of abundant caution, made it compulsory for a cellular instrument to carry a declaration of the radiation level it discharges. Despite all this, the number of "mobile maniacs" is growing. Globally, it is about 600 million today, and is expected to touch 1.5 billion in the next five years.

In India, the problem has not yet reached a level to cause undue concern. There are not too many cellular telephones going around - there are three million plus (compare this with China's 105 million) - but their number is bound to shoot up, now that they are becoming increasingly affordable.

With the prices of handsets (particularly in the grey market) and call charges diving, Chennai's growth rate has caught up with the other metros. It was 100 per cent last year, though the total number of mobile users in the city - 90,000 - is far below Mumbai's 400,000, and Delhi's almost 400,000. Kolkata claims to have touched the 100,000 mark.

Chennai started as a very conservative market, says RPG's vice- president, M. Padmanaban. It has always been a slow adapter, but it is picking up now, especially among the business classes, which see a tremendous potential in cellular communication. The pre-paid card has really helped the small trader, because he feels that "the expense is within his full control".

Yet, Chennai and the rest of India have still a long way to go before they can match Malaysia's 20 per cent penetration and China's eight percent.

However, this is perhaps the right time for every man and woman to decide how much of a mobile prisoner he or she would like to be.

Communication is fine, but when it becomes compulsive, even something as handy as the cellular telephone can be distracting and distasteful. And, who knows, a threat to our well-being.

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